IT SUCKS BEING COLD
by later2nite
Summary: Christmas Eve at Britin Manor, where the eggnog is killer strong!


IT SUCKS BEING COLD

Justin frowned at the half-finished work of art propped on his easel, unable to remember ever feeling so ambivalent toward something he'd created. Who in his right mind would buy this? he reproached himself, rubbing his weary eyes. Fighting to shake his pervading depression, he locked up his studio and called it a day.

Why the hell did I think I needed to paint in New York to become a big fat fucking success? whirled through his brain relentlessly as he walked back to the apartment he shared with Daphne's friend. Selling a whopping two whole paintings since he'd been in the city, the only thing Justin could successfully claim as his was failure. Pulling his woolen scarf tighter around his neck, the December cold seeped into his bones. What I wouldn't give for a Starbucks triple latte, he mused, but that was before he remembered he didn't have a ten dollar bill to his name.

"Jesus, Amy! It's colder in here than it is outside!" he grumbled after climbing nine flights of stairs to the hole-in-the-wall he called home. "What the fuck?" he cursed, making a mental note to find out why Daphne had neglected to inform him he'd be sharing space with a lunatic.

"Well, Justin, it was your turn to pay the utility bill this month. You did remember to pay it, didn't you?"

"Shit!" Christ! he lamented to himself. Another request to Dear Old Mom for a loan, just to tide me over until I can sell one more painting!

"I thought you had a rich boyfriend," Amy spat out, her acerbic tone grating on his nerves. "Why can't you ask him to help you out with expenses?"

Glancing out of the dingy window panes, Justin wondered how big of a splat his body would make on the pavement below. Despondent Artist Jumps From Nine Stories Up, the morning headline flashed before his eyes.

"Had is the key word there, Amy. I had a rich boyfriend. Calling off our wedding and moving to New York kind of screwed things up for me, you know?" Feeling the membranes in his nose starting to sting, he closed his eyes in misery, determined not to lose it in front of his roommate.

"You broke up?" she asked incredulously. "I thought Daphne said you two were made for each other. She told me you'd tamed the untamable beast. Said she'd never seen a greater love. Said she only hoped she'd find the man of her dreams someday, just like you'd found yours." Wrinkling her forehead, Amy only wanted to know one thing. "How does a love like that not stand the test of time?"

"Yeah," Justin scoffed, slinking off to the privacy of his freezing bedroom to nurse his heartache. "To quote the untamable beast, 'It's only time.'"

. . .

"Oh, Brian, everything looks amazing! You've really turned this mansion into a home!" Stepping into Britin's foyer with Michael and Ben, Debbie breathed in the delightful holiday atmosphere surrounding her, along with the tantalizing aroma of gingerbread cookies baking in the oven. "So, you decided to have all of us out here to your country manor on Christmas Eve?" she asked her host, hugging him tightly. "If I didn't know better, I'd say you've become downright domesticated!"

Brian shrugged at Michael, finally unresistant. "Welcome to Stepford," he said, the playful sarcasm befitting his mood, "where the fags are blissfully happy, healthy, and in the Christmas spirit."

"Another successful convert!" Ben laughed.

Hanging their coats in the entry's closet, Brian escorted his guests into the lavishly decorated great room, where the rest of the gang was already gathered. "What'll it be?" he asked them. "We've got a fully stocked bar. And help yourself to the cakes and pastries on the dining room table. Emmett and Darren are in the kitchen, baking more as we speak."

"When can we open the presents, Dad?" Gus sang out from under the Christmas tree, reading the name tags on all of the gifts. "How about tonight? Please?"

Lindsey and Brian exchanged helpless parent looks - the ones that accompany adorable offsprings' Christmas Eve pleas. "Maybe just one, Sonny Boy," Brian laughed, catching his son in his arms as he sped toward him for a hug.

"Brian, your state-of-the-art kitchen is positively a caterer's dream come true!" Emmett gushed, replenishing the silver cookie tray in the center of the coffee table. "Makes us realize how badly we need to update our appliances, doesn't it, Darren?"

Handing Emmett the cosmo he'd personally mixed for him, Brian gave him a hearty pat on the back. "Sit down and relax," he said. "I don't want you guys to work the entire evening. What would you like, Darren?"

Stoking the fire, Ted added two more logs before returning to Blake's side on the love seat in front of the fireplace. "I wonder what the poor, downtrodden, unfortunate souls of the world are doing tonight," he asked in mock superiority, his close friends proud of the way he'd turned his own shaky existence around the previous year.

Snickering politely, that richly endowed tight-knit circle of friends inwardly counted their blessings, every one of them vowing to amp up their charitable contributions.

"Not enjoying Christmas Eve in the lap of luxury here at Britin Manor, that's for sure!" Melanie blurted out, giggling at the well-timed hiccup that punctuated the end of her oddly pro-Brian declaration. Setting her empty cup of eggnog down on the end table, she handed Jenny Rebecca off to her wife. "Here, Linds," she said, slurring her words slightly. "You better take her."

"Are you all right, Mel?" Lindsey asked.

"It's the eggnog," Michael piped up, polishing off his own cup. "It's killer strong!"

Booming laughter now resounding off the walls, Brian slipped unobtrusively up the staircase. Ever thankful for his abundant good fortune, he considered doubling the amount he routinely donated to the Starving Artists Fund, his cock stirring when he remembered a time he'd had a starving artist of his own.

But that had been so long ago. How different his life had become, he smiled to himself.

Shivering at the top of the stairs, he wondered where the hell that starving artist turned big fat fucking success was, and why in the name of God the second floor of their mansion was so fucking cold. Entering their enormous bedroom, he realized an open window was to blame, his shuddering partner curled into the fetal position on top of their bed.

"I'm not afraid," a teeth-chattering Justin murmured in his sleep. "I don't want it. It means nothing."

Jesus! What's he dreaming about now? Brian wondered, rolling his eyes as he walked closer.

"How do you expect me to give you a rational response when the circumstances you've presented are completely suppositional, and as such, have no basis in reality?" Justin expounded, his state of mind clearly agitated.

"Justin, wake up! What are you doing in here with the window open?" Brian barked, sliding it shut. "You're gonna freeze your balls off!"

"You don't want to live with someone who sacrificed his life and called it love to be with you? Neither do I."

Sitting on the bed beside him, Brian leaned down and kissed his cold cheek, spying the empty eggnog cup on the nightstand. "How much of this shit did you drink? Justin, can you hear me?"

Struggling to open his eyes, Justin squinted at Brian, barely making out what he was saying. "Brian . . . you're here," he muttered, still in a daze. "I've missed you so much."

"Yeah, I'm here. Where the fuck else would I be?" Brian stretched out beside the thermally challenged mass of flesh, wrapping his arms around him. "Christ! You're practically frostbitten. How long have you been asleep?"

Justin snuggled closer to Brian, primal instincts drawing him to the heat. "Sleep?"

Briskly rubbing his arms, Brian tried to thaw him out. Plunging his hot tongue between his lips, he let his long legs cover Justin's. He knew his husband was coming around when he felt his tongue pushing back against his.

Nestling into Brian's body, Justin held onto him tightly, sucking on his tongue and grinding their dicks together. When he pried his eyes open all the way, he took a long look at his partner's handsome face, a warmth he hadn't experienced in forever beginning in his toes and working itself slowly upward through his limbs. Gradually becoming aware of a glorious buttery softness rustling against his torso, he separated his mouth from Brian's and uttered the most beautiful word in the English language. "Cashmere! I own cashmere!" Gazing down at his baby blue cashmere sweater, he broke into a megawatt smile.

"You own a closet full of cashmere. I didn't know you felt so strongly about it," Brian cracked.

"And a down comforter!" Justin exclaimed, pulling the feathery cover up to their necks. "I'll never be cold again!"

"You bought it right after we moved in here. Don't you remember? And what was that gibberish you were mumbling in your sleep? What had no basis in reality?"

Justin unbuckled Brian's belt, sliding his jeans off of him. "Oh, Brian, it was awful!" he wailed, tugging his own jeans down, too. "I dreamed we had this horribly emotional discussion the night before our rehearsal dinner. You convinced me that the art world in New York was just waiting for me to arrive, and that I had to move there to become a success. I hadn't seen you in so long," he winced at the memory. "I didn't know if I'd ever see you again."

Brian lifted Justin's sweater over his head and then shed his own black button-down shirt. "Now why the fuck would I want to do that?" he asked, clearly at a loss. "Your work was getting noticed here in Pittsburgh before we got married. You wouldn't have had to go to New York to paint." Kissing Justin's lips tenderly, he allowed himself a bit of reminiscing. "The night before our rehearsal dinner was great. You told me about the dream you'd had the night before that . . . the one where we were out here in our new house and I was riding you in the stable, diving into you in the pool, and slamming you on the tennis court." Raising his eyebrows, Brian went on. "When I joked, 'Wouldn't you rather just cuddle?' you said, 'Hell, no! I want you to fuck my brains out!' You do remember that, don't you?"

"Actually, I said, 'Hell, no! I'm gonna blow you, then I want you to fuck my brains out.' You haven't forgotten that, have you?" Justin shimmied under the cover toward Brian's dick, a memory jog surely in order. Taking his hardening cock between his lips, he licked the underside of it and then swirled his tongue around it.

Fondling the nape of Justin's neck, Brian arched his back, shoving himself farther down his throat. Moaning erotically, he felt Justin's mouth sucking his cock with familiar expertise. Wedded bliss, he thought. So not a farce. "Roll over," he whispered, gently easing out of Justin's mouth.

Spreading the lube he'd taken from the nightstand drawer down the crack of Justin's ass, Brian carefully worked two fingers inside, rubbing them back and forth as Justin angled his ass for better penetration. Brian smiled when he saw him squirming around, scraping his leaking dick on the mattress beneath him.

Emitting a contented sigh, Brian pulled his fingers out of Justin's hole, slowly driving his bare cock in. His sighs morphed into unchecked grunts when the walls of Justin's ass squeezed his thrusting dick. Grasping for Justin's throbbing shaft, he jerked him hard, fucking his ass with a steady rhythm.

Justin reached a hand behind himself to the back of Brian's thigh when he felt their orgasms building. Balls tightening up, he unleashed a stream of cum into Brian's hand, his body reverberating with sensation. Moments later, he felt Brian slam into his ass one last time and shoot his cum deep inside his hole.

Racing hearts pounding in their chests, Brian eased his tensed-up muscles and crumpled on top of his husband. "Fuck, Justin!" he gasped. "That was an exact reenactment of the night before our rehearsal dinner!" He rolled toward the nightstand and fished in the drawer for a cum towel as their breathing gradually returned to normal. "We better get back down to our party," he laughed. "Did our Christmas Eve quickie banish your nightmare into obscurity, or will it haunt you for years to come?"

"You don't know the half of it!" Justin ranted while they cleaned up and dressed, anxious to share his eggnog-induced hardships. "Amy was a bitch. I had no money for Starbucks. I lived in a nine story walk-up that was always freezing. And are you ready for this? I couldn't paint for shit! No one would buy the crap I turned out. Brian, I was poor!"

"Fuck! That shit must be toxic," Brian quipped, eyeing the empty cup on the nightstand. "What else would make you dream such horse shit?"

Justin smiled just as the antique grandfather clock in the corner of their bedroom struck midnight. "Merry Christmas, Brian." He stood on tiptoe, kissing his lips.

"Merry Christmas, Sunshine," Brian whispered. "Remind me to throw out that damn eggnog!"


End file.
